Coal India to explore green mining technologies

The state-run coal major announced that it is exploring green mining options to minimize adverse environmental impact by leveraging a slew of eco-friendly technologies in its underground (UG) and open-cut (OC) mines.

With land turning out to be a major pain point for expansion of coal mining operations these technologies bypass land acquisition and avoid its degradation. The locked up coal assets left out earlier due to techno-commercial and safety concerns can now be unearthed through these technologies, Coal India (CIL) said.

CIL is exploring to ramp up its UG production by four-fold to 100 million tonne by FY 2030 from 25.6 million tonne in FY 2022. UG output is environmentally clean, minimally invasive on land degradation, society friendly. Around 70% of the country's coal reserves are conducive for UG mining.

The aim is to make UG production sizably supplement the OC output. At current rate, mineable coal reserves at existing OC will slowly start lowering. Among mass production technologies, CIL will introduce 50 continuous miners by FY 2025 with peak production potential of 25 million tonne per year. 21 such machines are already deployed in ECL, CCL and SECL producing 9 million tonne per year.

CIL is aiming to mine coal through punch entry in those OC mines which have reached their ultimate pit level. This could be done through a mix of technologies. The company plans to identify and implement 5 such mines through punch entry in phased manner till FY 2024. So that mineable coal assets can be extracted with economic viability.

CIL is planning to deploy 10 high wall machines in its OC mines during the ongoing fiscal with projected production potential of 5 million tonne per year. With one such project already operational in SECL three more will soon be functional in ECL. One highwall machine entails a capex of Rs 200 cr.

Coal India is a coal mining company engaged in the production and sale of coal. As of 31 March 2022, the Government of India held 66.13% stake while Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India held 11% stake in the company.

On a consolidated basis, the PSU coal major's net profit jumped 45.9% to Rs 6,692.94 crore on 22.6% increase in net sales to Rs 30,046.25 crore in Q4 FY22 over Q4 FY21.

Shares of Coal India rose 1.69% at Rs 183.10 on the BSE.

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